Earthquakes

(Quatrain 10-72)

The sloping park, great calamity,
Through "the Lands of the West" and Lombardy ( Italy)
The fire in the ship, plague and captivity;
Mercury in Sagitarius, Saturn fading.

The
sloping park (suggesting shifting ground?) great calamity (suggesting
earthquakes) through l'Hesperie (the Lands of the West, the New World;
more specifically, possibly America) and Lombardy (a region of northern
Italy).The fire in the ship (suggesting naval warfare?) plague (an
affliction or the spread of disease) and captivity (suggesting a
military occupation through war?); Mercury in Sagittarius, Saturn
fading (an astrological position occurring next on November 25, 2015;
then on November 23, 2016; and again on December 7, 2044)"
Could 2015 or 2016 be the years that earthquakes will occur in the United States and Italy?

Trouble
could occur in California, or New York City (where three fault lines
rest under Manhattan Island). An even larger disaster could occur in
the region known as the New Madrid fault line (as referenced in the
quatrain below).

All
the old roads will be improved, and one will travel down them to the
modern Memphis, the grand Mercury of Hercules fleur-de-lys, causing the
land, sea, and country to tremble, the old roads will be improved (this
places us in at least the 20th century), one will travel down them (by
automobile?) to modern Memphis (possibly suggesting Memphis,
Tennessee)The grand Mercury (Mercury was the Roman god of travel,
commerce, and thievery, who served as a messenger to the other gods and
was a common figure in alchemy) of Hercules (the mythological immortal
son of Zeus who was a hero of extraordinary strength).Fleur-de-lys
("fleur-de-lys" is associated with the Bourbons -- a French royal
family, perhaps Nostradamus is making an esoteric allusion to himself
in this line)

Causing
the land (the geographic region of the central-southern United States),
sea (possibly suggesting the Gulf of Mexico and the Atlantic Ocean),
and country (an allusion to the United States of America) to tremble
(suggesting an earthquake will occur, perhaps in the region comprising
the New Madrid fault line, which will be so powerful in the magnitude
of its destruction that it will affect the central and southern states
along the Mississippi River, as well as the southeastern coastal areas
of the United States).